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Seal, State

by Wiley J. Williams, 2006

The design of North Carolina's state seal, officially called the Great Seal of the State of North Carolina, was standardized by the General Assembly in 1971 and modified in 1983 after many variations. The official seal is a circle 2¼ inches in diameter that features the robe-covered figures of "Liberty" and "Plenty" in its center. Liberty is standing and holding a capped pole in her left hand, and in her right hand is a scroll on which is written the word "Constitution." Plenty is seated with her right arm extended, holding three heads of grain in her right hand and the end of an overflowing cornucopia in her left hand. In the background are depictions of mountains and a three-masted ship floating on the ocean. The dates "May 20, 1775" (the date of the so-called Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence) and "April 12, 1776" (the date of the Halifax Resolves) appear at the top and bottom, respectively, of the center part of the seal. Around the outside border of the seal are the phrases "The Great Seal of the State of North Carolina" and Esse Quam Videri, the state motto, meaning "to be rather than to seem."

References:

J. Bryan Grimes, The History of the Great Seal of the State of North Carolina (rev. ed., 1974).

There are, so far as we know, no records to explain why the 18th and 19th century designers of the State Seal chose to include the particular figures and items depicted on the Seal. However, the design elements are all fairly standard emblems, and would have been familiar to many people at that time.

Plenty is almost always depicted with a cornucopia (though it is not exclusively her symbol—several other mythological deities and semi-deities also carried the horn of plenty, or at least were depicted that way in paintings and sculpture). The cornucopia is symbol of nourishment and abundance.

Liberty is often depicted holding the pole and cap (sometimes called a Phrygian cap). The pole and cap were symbols of struggle and eventual freedom from tyranny and slavery--the pole was imitated later in Liberty Trees during the American Revolution; the cap was a symbol from antiquity, adapted and re-adapted by people in the 18th and 19th centuries). Thus, the designers wished to show that the state was both bountiful and free. The ship symbolizes the voyages of discovery and colonization that brought people to the land that became North Carolina.

The State Seal of Iowa has a flag surmounted by a Phrygian cap, and the Seal of New Jersey depicts both Liberty and Ceres with their standard emblems, so these symbols are not unique to the state.